A Friend is Another Self
by Devi Lethe
Summary: She is not as a he remembers. But then, neither is he. A reflection and a revelation between a young woman and an old man. Hinted Magneto/Mystique.


**"Thy friendship oft has made my heart to ache; **

**do be my enemy - for friendship's sake." **

**- William Blake**

The day was colder than usual; overcast and chilled to make for a muted light. He went to the tables in the park knowing the odds were against finding a partner. He went everyday. Erik Lehnsherr was a man who liked order and stability. He hadn't always, and part of him still didn't, but overall he found he preferred it now in the face of so much change. It was... comfortable.

He turned up his collar, huddled deeper into his coat, walked faster. He didn't really seem one of them still. He was old by anyone's standards, of course, but he didn't seem quite as old as he ought to be. His walk was too brisk, his back too straight; he failed to blend in with the other old men, who were much younger than they seemed, and who lacked even a fraction of his vitality.

Like the day itself, that vitality was currently muted. It made him smile a bit to feel camaraderie with something so quixotic as the weather.

Not one of the regulars was there to meet him. The tables were deserted, the pieces all still stowed away in their compartments. He might be the only one to set the board at all, but order demanded that he sit at the tables for at least an hour, as had become his custom, and Erik Lehnsherr liked his custom.

He did not sense the steel pieces in their jumble. He could not feel them from a distance of ten feet or so. He knew them from habit, and from memory, not by any trick of perception. He was cured. His powers were gone. It did no good to chase the past. He _did not_ sense them.

Perhaps if he had not been so focused on ignoring the tingle of awareness in his mind, he might have realized who the woman was before she came up to him.

"Hello, Erik."

Her voice was just as smooth as he remembered. Her body was the right shape, but she looked all wrong to him without the lovely azure tones highlighting every curve. Her hair was black. It looked horrifically incongruous against her olive complexion. Her coloring was so comprehensively human that he could barely conceive of her as the same woman. He could hardly classify this person - this human - as the beautiful Mystique.

No doubt she felt much the same toward the old man sitting alone in a park on a sad day meant to be spent indoors with loved ones.

Naturally, they were both out.

"You may not believe this, my dear, but you are the last person I would've expected to come looking for me, and the most welcome." They shared a knowing little smile. He asked, "Is it Raven now, or Mystique?"

"Neither. I go by Renee these days." Renee, the reborn. She looked away, shifting her weight. "I don't feel like Raven or Mystique. Both those names... they're part of a life that isn't mine anymore."

He thought of all the names he'd been known by in his day: Magneto, Magnus, even Max once upon a time. None of them could be applied to him now. He had become, in every sense, Erik Lehnsherr. His smile faded. "I know exactly what you mean."

The wind played with her sleek black strands, tossing them casually about her face. Once the wind wouldn't have dared to ruffle her. Every part of her had been smoothly controlled, even her carmine locks. She looked so composed standing there in her black top and slacks, her khaki jacket swaying around her body. Such a contrast to his last memory of her, lying naked and utterly exposed on a prison floor. Destroyed in every sense of the word. But then, he had been, too, a little later, and under different circumstances. Karma, perhaps. Irony for certain.

He nodded, more to himself than to her. "You're looking wonderful, Renee." Meeting her eyes, he thought she understood the apology hidden in his ordinary compliment. He knew he had already been forgiven, at least by her. She'd had her vengence handed to her by another. Had she thanked the Wolverine for his cleverness in meting out justice? No matter now, he realized. An old man had no need for grudges against beautiful young women kind enough to forgive his arrogance.

"May I?" she asked, gesturing to the bench across from him.

"Of course." He waited for her to take her seat before continuing, "Please don't mistake my pleasure in your visit but I have to ask, my dear, why did you find me?" He did not ask how. Her resourcefulness had not been altered by her transformation. She had likely known where he was and what he was doing with himself long before she chose to visit. The order he so desperately clung to and his custom had made it laughably easy. It occurred to him that he had been hoping for just such an occurence.

"I wasn't sure I wanted to for a long time." She shrugged. "But when you've been friends as long as we have, what's a little betrayal in the grand scheme of things?"

When she smiled, it was the sinister smirk he'd seen on her face more often than not and for a moment she transcended her human coloring. He saw Mystique in her as clearly as if she'd still been blue. Her eyes held the same mischevious glint as when they'd been yellow. Oh, yes. Despite being lovers, and enemies, and allies, and betrayers, they were indeed still friends. They understood one another.

"So," he said after a moment, "What now, Renee? Are we to be two humans locked together in isolation?"

Her humor deepened and became calculating. "That's my other reason for coming to see you. I..."

Erik frowned. It was so unlike her to lack the right words. "What is it?"

With only a very slight hesitation, she placed her hands on the board between them. She looked at her fingers, directing his gaze. Seconds passed. A minute. She seemed to be focusing very hard. Slowly, ever so slowly he thought he was imagining things, her nails turned black.

His sudden chill had nothing to do with the weather. "Merciful God." He blinked. "Who else knows?"

"Only you."

He felt a great swell of love for her in that instant, his friend, his lover, his sometimes companion, his renewed co-conspirator in a war with sides he could no longer define in simple terms. "How long ago?"

"A month to the day."

One week. He had one week to wait. One impossibly long, improbably short stretch of time. He stared at her ebony nails. "What about Renee?" he asked shrewdly.

She swallowed thickly. "I don't know, but you're the only one I can trust."

Strange that it was _not_ strange to hear her speak of trust between them. But then, he still trusted her. And he trusted that she would sometimes betray him, as he would sometimes betray her. He found it curious that so many of his friendships balanced on that line.

"I am not the same man I once was," he said.

"Yes," she agreed. "But you could be. I could be Mystique again. We could bring back the cause."

The words rang hollow. Unspoken it lay between them that they would not.

One week.

"I didn't know who else to come to," she added quietly, pulling her hands back self-consciously.

He saw that she regretted having burdened him with her knowledge, her choice. Mystique would never have apologized for her actions, but Mystique had always been certain of herself and her place. This woman was not Mystique anymore than he was Magneto. Perhaps they weren't Renee or an old man, either, but they couldn't go back to who they'd once been. He could well imagine her uncertainty. Would she turn blue again? Would she hide as she had always refused to before? She didn't have the luxury of being able to pass as ordinary in her natural state. How precarious the future must seem.

"Nor would I have known in your place, though I likely wouldn't have been brave enough to come knocking on your door." He found one of her hands beneath the table. It was warm and inviting. He squeezed it, delighted to feel her squeeze back. "Come. The weather today is not for sitting out of doors. Let me make you some tea."

She opened her mouth as if to speak but thought better of it. Instead she smiled and nodded. They would return to his townhouse, where he would serve earl grey. They would chat and enjoy each other's company. Later, they might go upstairs and know one another anew, as different people who were nonetheless familiar. She might stay, or she might leave. They would talk again, when his own powers returned, and face difficult decisions about the future.

But just now there was only an old man and a young woman taking a pleasant stroll on an unpleasant day.

It was, he realized, not so very different from before.


End file.
